you hit the stage and smile, cause god, what else can you do?
by screaming internally
Summary: in which lysa tully decides that she is going to have a good marriage, or she's gonna kill someone trying. ((slight title change to avoid censors))
1. sure, go ahead and dream

**you hit the stage and smile cause, shit, what else can you do?**

* * *

As soon as Lysa heard Hoster say it, she knew: the marriage was to be a punishment to her. A punishment for daring to try and have something of her own. Her father wanted to shunt her away, loveless and forgotten up a mountain with an old man, to wither and die.

No.

Good _gods_ no.

Lysa was not going to let her father pack her off to be married to Lord Arryn, to be forgotten and miserable in matrimony to a man old enough to be her father. If Lysa was to marry Lord Arryn, then she was going to have a good - nay, a _content,_ a _happy_ marriage with Jon Arryn, or Lysa would kill someone trying.

* * *

Lord Arryn and Lysa faced each other in the bed chamber, stripped for a bedding that neither is certain how to begin. Arryn was watching her, Lysa was calculating her words.

Lysa says nothing beyond the mild pleasantries the entire time, deciding to save blunt honesty for when she knows this stranger, this husband, better.

Jon Arryn snores with his breaths, and Lysa gazes at his back, at the moon through the window, at the door through which she had been flung from into this new reality. there is war, her new husband spearing the head - the thought occurs to her that she may become a widow before she is truly a wife, but it is quickly brushed aside in favour of considering the future that is just a possible. with a deep breath, Lysa decides that, in all, the situation could be far, far worse.

* * *

She and Arryn lie together three times while he stays in Riverrun, before the war effort is resumed - postponed for two weeks in which she and Cat were wed and bedded by each husband.

The morning the men all march off together in their grand procession - off to kill a king and a prince and overthrow a dynasty and save a fair maiden - Lysa and Cat and Ed all stand together to say farewells. Ed is crying, both from being left behind and from the pall of potential, probable death hanging over the men in the yard- Father and Uncle are to return within weeks, but they will fight, and could still die. Arryn and Lysa had said their goodbyes in the early morn, Cat and her stone-faced northron husband speaking quietly to one side. Lord Tully watches her, something that Lysa cannot name in his eyes, but does not approach her except to pat her face and tell her to be a good girl for her sister and the steward as they rule Riverrun in his absence.

Lysa silently seethes at his patronisation - first he poisons her babe from her belly, casts Petyr from his longest home, then weds her to Arryn, and yet he still treats her as if she is still a foolish, airheaded child, unable to sort his lies from his truths? Lysa feels something like bile rise in her mouth, but it is quickly dispelled with a hug from her Uncle Blackfish; he may always love Cat most, everyone loves Cat most, but Lysa has always felt softer toward her nuncle than the man who sired her.

* * *

Lysa _screams._ She screams and screams and screams until it appears the pitch of her voice has put a crack in the glass-paned windows. Between her legs, her child is screaming too, announcing their presence to the world, beginning the moment her babe is aware that they are no longer in her womb.

* * *

Lord Arryn strides into the room, his eyes locked on the image Lysa knows she presents - a tired, successful wife with a living, breathing child in her arms, the first for the both of them.

He stops just shy of the bed, not appearing to believe his eyes. Lysa levels her gaze to meet his.

"The heir to the Vale, my lord. A son."


	2. you're just trying to blow off steam

chap 2: **you're just trying to blow off steam, girlie. not that i blame you, every night's the same.**

* * *

Somehow, the smell of King's Landing was worst to the olfactory system of a woman just completed in the birthing bed. Or perhaps it was just the smell of her own blood in the sheets making the whole thing worse.

Lysa was sure she would never be more joyous. Her smile threatened to split her face in two, she couldn't stop. Forget all the pain of birth, forget the worry that the child would not live, forget the anger that her father may have poisoned her ability to have any children - her was the proof of her efforts, warm and weighted in her arms, her husband's brown eyes blinking up at her.

As the maids changed her bed and her son was cleaned, Lysa's own hair and clothes changed, Lysa kept her eyes fixed firmly on her son. The maester seemed as pleased as her husband would likely be, saying "A boy, my lady. He is in perfect health." as if Lysa could not tell that simply from looking at him.

When the Hand of the King entered the room, he did not throw the doors open, nor march into the room like a conquering warlord, the way some women would describe their husbands when their children were born. Instead, he quietly opened the door, walking with soft, sure steps into the birthing chamber, his apprehension clear on his face. Having lost one child and wife to the childbed before, he clearly did not know what to do with a wife and child that survived one. he did not come closer than the foot of the bed, his wife and son the only other occupants in the room. Lysa looked him square in the eyes.

"The heir to the Vale, my lord. A son." His face did not change. Lysa fought not to roll her eyes, nor furrow her brow. "A son in perfect health. If you wish to hold him."

He approached her, sitting on the bed. Wordlessly, Lysa passed their son to his father. Carefully, Jon held his son, wonder and joy colouring his features. It was a good look for him of the stoic disposition. Carefully, he adjusted his son to touch his face. His head whipped up to look at her. His eyes softened again at her.

"I have never held a living child of my own, my lady. Thank you for giving me this."

Lysa could feel tears in the edges of her eyes. She blinked to keep them from falling. "What should his name be? I do not want him to be named for someone he'll live in the shadow of."

"What do you mean?"

"I do not want my children to be raised in the shadow of someone that they may never step out of. The king, my father, some great knight that cast a legacy a century long. Some loved, dead relative that we can't help but see whenever we look at them. He deserves better than that."

Lord Jon understood her meaning entirely. "I had thought to name him for my nephew Elbert, who the Mad King had executed with Brandon Stark, but you make a good point, my lady. What about Roland, for the king who began building the Eyrie? He lived well before the Targaryen's Conquest."

Lysa smiled.

Roland Arryn.

* * *

Dinner between Lysa and Jon was never a particularly vibrant affair. Married almost two years, a young, growing son, and a decently civil relationship. It that what most marriages are? Lysa considered the thought in silence when her mind hit another thought - she didn't quite know her husband's opinion of the head of House Tully. Lysa hated her father, although not with the boiling rage she once did - now it was more of a dull anger, something that she could forget for a while, and have it come swinging back into full force when she had to remember it. No time like the present to find out whether she had a partner in hatred.

"If I ask you a question, can you promise to answer it truthfully?"

Lord Jon quirked an eyebrow at her, apparently interested enough in the suggestion of of a conversation to humour her. "Of course."

"Do you care for my father - did he endear himself to you when you met him?"

Lord Jon frowned and opened his mouth - looking ready to lie.

"You did promise the truth, my lord."

His mouth snapped close with a click of his teeth, before taking a breath through his nose and speaking quickly, as if hoping to speak quick enough Lysa wouldn't register the words. "No. I found myself hating him - there were moments during the negotiations I wanted to kill him."

Lord Jon had the grace to look ashamed of the words. Lysa suppressed a snort. "That is something we have in common then, my Lord," she said.

Her husband was surprised by the sentence, judging by his gaping mouth.


	3. you finish the show

chap 3: **you finish the show, you rinse out your tights.**

* * *

Lysa wanted more than one child. She had proven that she could carry a child to birth, and that the child would live. Her little Roland, approaching his second birthday, was nothing less than a shining light in her life. She wanted him to have a sibling, a little brother or sister to love as she did her siblings, despite her worst moments. The trouble was, her husband did not seem to be on the same page, and convincing him of bedding her was proving to be like jousting: missing the mark was sometimes just as likely as striking true. Lysa was starting to be convinced that Lord Jon was asking ahead whether or not his wife was in his bed chambers before he turned in for the night, just so he wouldn't have to encounter her.

So. Clever minds had a tendency to get what they wanted, so Lysa was forced to be creative. Well, blunt.

Her plan was simple to execute, but a matter of precise timing - Lord Jon had to be getting ready for bed, but not so fully dressed that he could force her from his rooms, and his sleeping hours were notoriously unpredictable due to the workload he endured. Lysa thought that blunt honesty about her intentions would get the convincing part right, and her body certainly held enough charms despite her time in the birthing bed, given that she fit right back into the gowns she'd worn before Roland had made his existence known to the world at large.

Lord Jon's surprise at her unceremonious, unannounced bursting into his rooms almost made Lysa laugh. His eyes wide, mouth gaping, halfway out a tunic, he looked nothing like the stately, refined man the realm knew of. She found it endearing.

"My wife, I-"

Lysa cut off his words. "My husband, this is absurd. You have clearly been avoiding your conjugal rights, even against the desires of your wife." She took the tunic from his hands, softening her words and gestures. He gaped, and Lysa continued. "Our son is almost upon his second nameday, and there is nothing that might please me more than telling him he can expect a sibling in time for his third. You will mind me."

That shook her husband from his stupor. "Lysa, we have a child. More are not necessary."

"Perhaps not. But they are wanted. What did you think you were getting when we wed?"

"I had thought that I could give you one child, that you would not be happy to be wed to me, but that a child would ease the situation." Arryn did not demonstrate any emotion as he said the words, as though his wife would be the most miserable wretch to exist, to have to marry him. Lysa arched an eyebrow.

"Well, my lord husband, I have a thing to say to your decision. First," she held up a finger to count them out, " _I_ gave _you_ a child. I did not see you in that birthing chamber. Second, being married to you would hardly be considered a hardship - we would have to see each other more than once a day for that to be true. Third, when my father had declared to me that I was to marry you, I knew that it was to be some form of punishment for my decision to lose my maidenhead before marriage, which if something I think you know. Dynastically, yes, our marriage is good for both House Tully and House Arryn. But on a personal level? Hoster Tully thought there wasn't much about you as a person that could make me happy in the way I had dreamed of as a young girl."

Lord Jon winced at her words, but Lysa barrelled forward in her speech anyway.

"I knew that my father wanted me to grow to be miserable. I refuse to be. Uncle Brynden once told me that short of killing those who harm you, then living well despite them is the best revenge. My father wants me to be unhappy in our marriage. He wants you to be uncomfortable with a wife as young as I am. What I want is to grow old, fat and happy with you, surrounded by children and grandchildren. There is nothing he would hate more."

Lord Jon was staring at her, surprise clear as day on his face. But . . there is something in his eyes. Was it . . hope? Pleasure? Lysa didn't quite care.

"Now, you can either stand at the foot of this bed and blather on about you honour and the shame in having a wife like me all night, or you can fuck me until I have another child to call our own. Because I know which I would choose."

With that, Lysa pulled her shift over her head walked around the side, making sure her husband saw her full nude body, and slid atop the sheets.

Her husband was clearly as smart as his reputation, because he joined her.

* * *

(note: Jon Arryn knows the need for secure house lines in numbers of children - obviously - he's just shocked because Lysa's being so blunt.)

here's a little chapter! I've lost some motivation for this story, unfortunately, so this is the best I can offer. hopefully I'll get it back


	4. you dive into a dive and raise a toast

chap 4: **you dive into a dive and raise a toast to better nights**

* * *

Lysa's changed in her marriage. This is the first thing Brynden notices when he sees her. Even without the babe on her hip, the swell of another at her belly - Lysa is not the young girl she was at Riverrun. It's there in her face, in her posture. Brynden finds himself smiling at the sight.

Having come to swear himself to her husband's service after yet another argument with his brother - more mutterings about how he should be married, more shouting about it, more of Brynden shouting refusals, more of his brother banishing him in a fit of rage - he wasn't entirely certain what to expect, when he was on the road. He'd considered going north, to see Cat, swear himself to her Northron husband, but had quickly decided otherwise. Despite his own hatred for the cold helping his decision, he's always had a particular soft spot for little Lysa. Quieter, less confident than her siblings, always the one off to the side, Brynden had hoped to see how her marriage had effected her - hopefully, not too badly. Brynden may not have been as open with his affections for his niece, but he has never wanted anything other than her happiness. Her misery would be unbearable.

Instead, she seems to have flourished. There's an air of confidence in her when she greets him. She's secure, confident and composed in a way she never was in Riverrun. He quite likes it.

Her new bluntness is rather enjoyable, too. He joins the Lord and Lady Arryn at their dinner table for the first week, and Lysa and her husband's back-and-forth is easily a thing of pure humour for any onlookers. In a form the likes of which he's never seen before, Lysa is equal amounts gently-chiding, teasing and conversing with her husband, who has never struck Brynden as someone who could appreciate that sort of thing.

He asks her about it, when he's sitting with her and her son, the little boy Roland. He's been bequeathed the name Rolly, given that the boy has quickly grown into the pudgy baby-fat most infants seem to have. He's a little heavier than Brynden expects whenever he lifts the child, but Lysa doesn't have the slightest stutter whenever she lifts her son into her arms.

She's sitting with her son on her lap - Rolly has reached the age of being able to totter on his chubby legs, and is fond of sitting with his head pressed against Lysa's belly, listening to the twin heartbeats within Brynden's niece.

"When did you and Lord Jon become so comfortable?" Perhaps not the most elegant question, but Lysa does give him her full attention.

She strokes her son's soft hair when she replies, "We did not become so comfortable for a while, uncle. It took me trying to get pregnant a second time," she gestures to her slightly-bulging stomach, and the son pressed against it, when she says so, "before we had what we do now. He was good before then, kind and noble. The king keeps him busy, so we find happiness were we can."

Brynden is a little surprised to hear it. Jon Arryn has never struck him as a warm individual, but he did seem a kind one; but Lysa has historically not been known for being patient at searching for people's affection toward her. Perhaps the tales of people changing in marriage are true. Hoster hadn't seemed to change much during his time with Minisa, except to be happier, and Min's death had hardened him as a man - not to his children, not ever, but he wasn't the man he had been before. Lysa, on the other hand, is glowing with good health. Her love for her child - children, soon - brings a life to her Brynden had never noticed her missing.

He smiles at her. "Your life suits you, little Lysa. Motherhood has made you blossom."

She just grins at him.


	5. you get a little drunk

chap 5: **you get a little drunk and maybe start a few fights, but you grin and bare it**

* * *

There are times when Jon catches himself - he finds himself thinking of his wife in ways he shouldn't. He thinks he might love her. He doesn't think she'd want that.

He loved Jeyne, when he wed her. A young man when he'd wed the first time, Jeyne had brought bright smiles to his face with ease. They'd lain without expectation of children, just for the joy of being in each other's arms. When she'd died, he'd worn mourning for two years, both for Jeyne and the baby girl she'd died with. He doesn't think he's ever cried so hard since, save for Rowena.

She'd come a while after, after Jeyne. Jon could remember her bright, clever eyes, how they'd dimmed with the fever that had snuck up on them, slowly and then quickly ripping the life from her. He'd held her hand as she'd died, stroking her dark hair with trembling fingers.

He misses his siblings, Ronnel and Alys, with the same steady ache as Jeyne and Rowena. He can go days without thinking of any of them - easier now than it had been in the last few decades, with his position and Robert's failing desire to pay attention leaving it all to him. He misses Ronnel's laugh, Alys' grace and steady hands. He thinks he sees shades of them in his life now, however. Like his four missing loves are inserting their souls into his life now, in fractions.

Roland has Ronnel's smile, the brightness of his youth mimicking his dead uncle, before he'd taken that blow to the skull. Jon prays, prays, that the ill luck that has cursed House Arryn over the generations does not touch his son, his bright boy. If he outlives his own - again - Jon thinks he may go mad. Celia is his newest joy, as well.

Only a few moons old, not yet a year, she's filled his life with a lightness he's missed since first fostering Ned and Robert. Too young to miss her father's presence, she always seems happy to see him. Babbling with noise, a toothless smile on her face, she reaches for him whenever she realises he's there. Jon's never had a child reach for him, not one of his own. Now he has two.

For this, he will never be able to thank his wife enough. Lysa. He wishes to tell her that, to hold her the way he held Jeyne and Rowena before her, with the love and care a beautiful lady deserves. He cannot bring himself to voice it, the words catching in his throat. He does not know how to speak to her, his wife. He's gotten better, over the years, he knows this.

There are times he disgusts himself. The images in his mind, the fantasies he'll never admit he holds - he is no Walder Frey, but the thoughts in his mind compared to his reality make him feel like the worst scum in the kingdoms. Lysa deserves better than having an old man lust over her like a particularly unfortunate whore being groped by a patron.

He didn't know what to _do_ with her, at first. He'd gotten used to being the sole Arryn of the Vale, the Lord without a Lady. Now, he doesn't want to imagine being without her. He doesn't think his household does, either. He hadn't expected this girl, this woman, to worm her way into his life so firmly that if she were removed the whole structure of his life might collapse, like a crucial brick being removed from a building causing destruction. She's slotted herself into the running of the household, ruling with a deft and fair hand.

She's done the same with his heart, truly.

She'd seemed a shy thing, when they'd wed. But even then, he'd seen something in her eyes. A burning flame - it had been there that first night, in their awkward bedding. He'd dismissed it as a flicker from the hearth, but he's wondered, over the years, if it hadn't been the first spark of her determination to create a life with him. To fit a life between them. She'd told him, then - not seducing him, _convincing_ him into bed, that she was determined to live a good marriage with him. That her father's attempts at having a hand in her future would go no farther than the name of her husband. Whatever life she led, that it would be her own. Jon hadn't expected the blunt honesty - he still didn't, at times, for her to open her mouth and brutal truth to come out - but it had quickly endeared him to her just as much as their children had. In the pit that was King's Landing, honesty was rare. That he has it in his marriage, especially one with a beginning such as his, Jon will forever be thankful for.

He hadn't like Hoster Tully, when he'd met with him. Tully's cold, ice-like eyes had not changed when he'd broached the request that Ned marry Lady Catelyn, that Jon marry Lysa. Tully, willing to sell his daughters off for power, connections and blades, careless of his own children's desires, the needs of Jon's boys trying to get the closest thing to justice that they could. Jon had wanted to slice the man's throat. Instead, he'd married his daughter.

Jon doesn't think he'll ever quite forgive himself that.

* * *

(Jeyne and Rowena are Jon Arryn's wives before Lysa. GRRM hasn't said much about them, just that Jeyne died with her child and that Rowena died without kids. I made up my own stuff about them. Ronnel and Alys are Jon's siblings in the family tree, but they're dead too, and that means I get to make up my own headcanons about the tragic Arryn family!)

I meant for this to reach into the Greyjoy rebellion but it didn't happen.


	6. you run for the train

chap 6: **you run for the train, the one you just missed**

* * *

So Balon Greyjoy had decided to expand. An understandable desire, given the inhospitable, un-farmable spit of lands that made up the Iron Islands - yet a desire easily prone to disaster. Ironborn were good at raids - not long, drawn-out conquests. Not since the fall of the little empire House Hoare had carved out in the Riverlands, before the conquest of the Targaryens. Lysa may not have been the best student in her histories, but she did know that: Ironborn had built the castle her mother, the late Lady Minisa, had hailed from. The Ironborn were both an ancestor to the Riverlands, and a constant thorn in their side. Of course, she was nowhere near danger - still in Kings Landing, tucked away with the rest of the Court and presided over by an increasingly bitter Cersei Lannister (although she was very good at pretending she wasn't, when she could be bothered to pretend at all).

Jon, of course, was helping the increasingly larger King Robert devise battle plans, helping those not Ironborn to co-ordinate attacks and, of course, run the country.

As Lysa suckled her newest babe, her third - another boy, named Jasper for Jon's father - she wondered whether or not there would be time after the Greyjoy's little attempt at rebellion for Jon to take some time off, to travel back to the Vale, if only for a visit. They'd been before, after Rolly's birth, and Lysa had been awed at the architecture - not so much the height, nor was she enamoured in the manner a person had to take to just get up to the Eyrie, but she'd enjoyed herself. Rolly, for all his youth, had liked it as well, keeping his little eyes locked on the clouds in the windows. None of their other children had had the chance to see their father's traditional seat of power, and Lysa sometimes amused herself with imaginations of Celia's reactions to the castle, with Roland's imaginary mischief in the winding hallways.

To say that Lysa wanted to get out of King's Landing for a while would be a vast understatement.

* * *

But, of course, Lysa rarely gets what she wants out of life.

Instead of leaving the city the second the news of the war's end reached her, Lysa had to _stay_. Stay and help her dear, beloved, beautiful (cruel, unlikable, still beautiful) Queen organise a celebration. A tourney, to be held in Lannisport, to showcase the wealth of the queen's family, and the unity of the Seven Kingdoms once again. Lysa had to stop herself from smacking her head into the breakfast table almost every morning, and the dinner table every evening. It seemed she would never. leave. the bloody city.

Lysa did not want to go to Lannisport, she did not want to sit through a tourney, she did not want to see Lord Hoster Tully at banquets where she would have to act polite and happy to see him.

Lysa wanted to grab her husband and children and uncle, and climb a mountain where no one could get to them. Where Robert Baratheon and Cersei Lannister and their whims would not touch Jon. Where she could sleep in her bed with her husband's warmth next to her, the way it hadn't been for months.

Gods- _damn_ Balon Greyjoy and his greed.

* * *

There was one good thing about the sweltering heat and gaudy gold-plated _everything_ of Lannisport - it was the presence of Cat. Her sister had left Lysa for the North, her husband and children and snow and cold. As it turned out, the cool air above the Neck did wonders for Cat's complexion.

As had motherhood. Cat had not brought any of her children, but just by looking at her, Lysa could see clearly that her sister was flourishing. It made her happy.

What did **not** was the bloody tourney and feast that Lysa had to sit through - she enjoyed celebrations as much as anyone else, but when all she had wanted for months was to be in the Vale with her husband and children, her patience was not at it's utmost. At the very least, she had Jon back in her bed for the duration.

* * *

Ah ha ha - you thought I'd be away this long and come back with something of substance and emotional depth that might further a plot or deal with the emotional situation of the characters? _Don't you know me at all?_


	7. you're out of cigarettes

chap 7: **you're out of cigarettes, you've got a headache, and you're pissed.**

* * *

It prickles at Roland, sometimes, the way people look at his mother and father.

He can see it in their stares as his family walks the halls of the Red Keep, the streets of Kings Landing. They see his father, his sagging jowls and weathered skin, every year of the Lord Hand's life experience showing on his face the way the King's every cup of wine shows larger on his fat belly with every passing week; and then the stares swing to Roland's mother, obviously far younger, for all her years of child after child have been left more heavily on her figure.

Roland hates it. Hates that people only see the differences in age in his parents, rather than love and happiness, rather than a marriage with more respect and care than the once portrait-perfect image of the King and Queen of the Seven Kingdoms has ever known.

He thinks that respect and appreciation for one another is the key to marriage, more than anything. He's fourteen now, he knows that love doesn't always last. He knows an appealing image that looks well doesn't last. Queen Cersei may be beautiful, and have given the King beautiful children, but King Robert and his wife have as much love between them as a hunting dog does for its prey. Probably less.

A marriage built on alliances and politics, with no love or respect or consideration equals three children.

A marriage built on alliances and politics with respect and care and love, equals four.

Joffrey, Myrcella and Tommen Baratheon.

Roland, Celia, Jasper and Arwen Arryn.

And not one of his siblings has half the cruelty Joffrey has in his tiniest toe.

The crown prince makes his skin crawl. Roland hates spending time with him. Roland likes archery, likes swordplay, likes hunting. He does not like the killing, the crying wails of dying animals, the way blood spurts out of dying things, or the way Joffrey relishes all of that.

Roland loves his siblings, and his Uncle Blackfish and his Uncle Ed, loves his mother and father and the cousins in the North he's met only once.

He doesn't think Joffrey loves much of anything, except causing pain and maybe his cold queen mother (and what does that say about her?)

 _Gods_ , but he cannot wait for his trip to end. His fosterage to Lord Bronze Yohn Royce was honestly the best thing about turning ten, and his Mother agreeing to send him away. Roland does miss his family when he's in the Vale, but weekly letters and only seeing his Mother and brother and sisters four or five times a year is honestly a price Roland is happy to pay, in exchange for not having to deal with Joffrey five dozen times a week.

"Rolly!" is the babyish yell from his bedroom door. Arwen is six, and all baby wisp-curls the same brown as Roland's own, her blue eyes exactly like their mothers. Roland _adores_ her, mostly because she isn't half the brat Celia behaves now, swishing about in lacy skirts because the stable boys and minor lordlings all trip over their own tongues if she smiles at them.

"What, favourite little brat?" he asks, getting quickly across his room and hoisting his little sister into his arms.

"Oi!" It's Jasper. "I resent that." He's nine, and forever demanding Roland's attention as his only brother. He always has it, Roland is never not paying attention to his siblings, but riling them up is too much fun. Roland pokes his tongue at his brother as Arwen babbles from the floor where she's been deposited again.

"Mama says to tell you to come down to her solar, because she's got a letter from Aunt Cat and Uncle Ned and she says that it mentions you and Jasp and Celia and me, but she's not gonna read it out to us unless we're all there so you need to COME ON!"

Jasper snickers as Arwen yanks both of them out of the room.

* * *

no, this isn't dead. I just didn't know where to go from the last chapter

so this is mostly family feels and getting a sense of what KL and the Red Keep is like for the people living there. And what it feels like to be part of a family where your parents have SUCH an age gap but love each other, but where all people see is the age gap. Also I wanted to consider what being the eldest in a Jon/Lysa marriage would be like. Roland loves his parents, but he's got all the baggage of being Heir that there's a bit of distance for him, emotionally.


	8. you lie awake

chap 8: **You lie awake, countin all the bald heads you kissed, but you grin and bare it.**

* * *

Lysa stared out the window – the night sky seen from the Eyrie was something very different from any other kind, she'd found. The moon had little ability to light up the castle, hidden as it was by wall behind Lysa's head. Instead, candles attempted the same – not an easy feat, given the high tendency for gusting winds to cut violently through any foolishly opened window. Specialised glass windows had been embedded to protect against the strong gales, and it reflected the warm fire that gave Lysa light to see her embroidery, now dismissed on her lap.

Troubling news from Kings Landing was delivered with dinner that night. A sweating flu, attacking the poor and rich alike, young or old. The queen and crown prince sick with it. The King extending his hunt in the Kingswood to try and avoid catching it.

Lysa was counting her blessings – none of her children were anywhere near the Crownlands, and Jon, thank goodness, had enforced his own rule to visit his seat of power, his home, no less than thrice per year, and had arrived just four days ago.

But – this flu had only emerged into knowledge in the last week, yet already Jon had news from the goldcloaks that the dead already counted close to eighty. And rising.

The night was black, the clouds travelling past faster than they would closer to the ground. The stars glittered brightly between the clouds.

* * *

It was six weeks for them. Six weeks of House Arryn being up their mountain castle before they could come down without risking sweat.

The Queen of the Seven Kingdoms was dead. The Crown Prince of the Seven Kingdoms was dead. The realm was required to be in mourning – although many more had lost their lives, the two most important for the Baratheon dynasty had been lost.

The question on everyone's mind was obvious: now what?

Prince Tommen had, blessfully, by nature of his fosterage at his uncle's on Dragonstone, been ignored by the sweating fever that had taken his mother and older brother. Princess Myrcella had also avoided illness thus far. Fortunately for the survivors, the illness seemed to have passed as suddenly as it had come – a full week had gone by, seven weeks of Lysa having her whole family in the Vale, nowhere near the capital. But the danger seemed to have passed, and so it was time to for the Arryns to come down from their mountain.

* * *

The letter shivered in Lysa's hands. Not obviously, but the tremor required Lysa to put the paper down upon her reading desk. Petyr was dead. He'd been in Kings Landing when the fever had first broken out – he'd been among the first infected.

Of course, it had taken this long – Petyr may have been Lord of the Fingers, a Vale lordling, but he barely ever set foot there, and as such, he was only required to make Jon aware of the Fingers on a yearly basis; ever since he'd established his whorehouses in Kings Landing and Gulltown, they had functioned as Petyr's home. While he'd tried to get Lysa to whisper his praises to Jon, Petyr Baelish's ever-lingering desire for power and a wish to be Master of Coin, Lysa had not turned him down, but simply refrained from voicing an opinion when Jon had been reviewing the choices for the position.

She hadn't heard from Petyr since then. It seemed his whispered promises of love only lasted as long as a summer rain.

But still, the rejection of the affection Lysa had held for Petyr aside, the loss of someone she had once cherished ached. According to the letter, written by Petyr's aide, the man Lysa had once wanted to call husband had died alone.

Even Cersei Lannister died with her twin by her side.

* * *

The funerals were long, the mourning period longer, and the processions of the aftermath of both the plague and the loss of the new dynasty's queen and its heir ate up all of Jon's time for the next several months.

Granted, the King's lack of love for either members of his family that had died was obvious to anyone who saw him – each day, the King seemed to get drunker, as if he was unable to be sober at all; but the tears of Princess Myrcella and Prince Tommen made Lysa ache. To be cursed with such a father! If nothing else, Hoster Tully had done his children the dignity of mourning his wife publicly. Robert Baratheon openly groped the serving maids while Jaime Lannister glared at him as if trying to decide whether or not to become a kingslayer for the second time in his life.

Lysa had known of Robert's lecherousness, it had been common knowledge from before the rebellion that the eldest Baratheon was oft whoring, but this . . . _display_ was enough to turn her stomach at the table. Lysa looked at her husband, sitting to her left upon the dais, to see if Jon had a similar thought. His brown-eyed gaze caught hers, and – the expression in them was enough for her to understand that her husband felt the same about their royal king's behaviour as she did.

* * *

Both the King's Hand and his lady wife left their plates barely touched during the mourning dinner; it was a striking difference to the unending times the King's own dishes needed filling.


End file.
